


Simplicity

by Amber_Flicker



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: (but no torture), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Enemies to Friends, Gen, Hartley is not okay, Interrogation, Kidnapping, Pre-Series, Pre-Slash, but if you don't ship it this is still readable, implied depression, sort of, tagged the ship because I imagine they eventually get together in this AU and there's hints to it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-22 02:13:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8268859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amber_Flicker/pseuds/Amber_Flicker
Summary: Leonard Snart needs to know about the Particle Accelerator. He kidnaps Hartley Rathaway. It does not go the way he expected.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note that for fic purposes Lisa, Len, and Mick got back together earlier than in the show.

Leonard Snart was a thief. This, _this_ wasn't what he usually did. Ask him to steal something, absolutely. But kidnapping was not his thing. He'd done it a couple times, yes, but it wasn't like stealing, because whereas that could be carefully planned down to the last detail, kidnapping could not. It involved a person, an unpredictable variable, and things could get messy in an instant.

Still, here he was.

The person had wanted the plans for the Particle Accelerator, wanted to patent the design before S.T.A.R's unveiling of their own in a couple weeks, and take claim of the invention first. Len didn't really care about the details of why. The matter of getting in and taking them, on the other hand... It would be difficult, the security was high, and blueprints were likely to not have every detail, especially this close to the date. He could take files from the computer, but that carried the same issue, plus getting into the system in the first place- he didn't have a hacker. That left taking someone, and there were very few people deeply involved enough in the project to know everything. There was no way he was getting to Harrison Wells.

That's when he found it. The guy had been working on it since the beginning, was higher up than just about anyone. And he'd been fired within the past couple weeks. The reason was not specified, but Len figured he'd be pretty pissed about it no matter why it happened, more likely to tell him what he needed to know. Supposed to be some sort of genius. Surely he remembered enough. He could get the blueprints and then get more information. It seemed simple enough. 

Nothing was ever simple when it involved kidnapping, and he should've known better.

***

Lisa sighs when he tells them the plan, as if she knows already that it's a bad idea. Mick doesn't say how he feels about it, but then, he never does. It takes nearly a week to get everything in order. Lisa's going to go break into the labs while they take him and get the info out of him, and then they get paid.

He picks a safehouse that still has an unfinished basement, left that way just for this purpose. He likes his houses to be at least decently furnished and decorated, which makes a too-pleasant atmosphere for interrogations (and/or torture), and even though Len doesn't do this much, it must be accounted for in his dozens of plans. So they have _The Room._ It's a bit of a stereotypical space, dull and dim, but it works. There's a couple chairs, and a table, and all of it's slightly off, not quite lined up straight, which is surprisingly effective at further agitating anyone locked in.

Hartley Rathaway is even prettier in person, all dark hair and blue eyes, and Len can't help reaching over to fix his skewed glasses (it's mainly to gauge his reaction- he doesn't move beyond a minute flinch. He can work with that).

He doesn't expect Rathaway to speak first, but he's surprised when he is.

"I'm afraid if you were planning on ransoming me, you're going to be disappointed." 

"Why's that?" He asks, and sure, they weren't planning on that and he could just tell their hostage that, but he's genuinely interested in what he'll get in reply. This isn't one of the usual lines he gets thrown, not like the _'you'll never get away with this'_ or _'I'll pay you more'_

"Because," he smiles a brittle smile, something so fragile in it's composition that Len thinks a single touch would break it, "no one cares about me anymore."

 

He can't help but feel he missed something in his research.

 

"Talk to me about the Particle Accelerator."

He stares at Len for a moment, seeming to wonder if he's serious. "You don't want to know about that." Len can't quite decipher his tone, and that irritates him.

"Wouldn't be asking if I didn't." 

"If you want it so badly, go to S.T.A.R Labs. I'm not helping anyone else with that thing."

So he's bitter about something involving it. He decides to start prying into that- maybe it'll be enough to break him down without going straight for violence. He does have Mick outside in case it does come to that, and it isn't that he can't do it, but it's messy and sometimes unneeded. Hartley Rathaway is a scientist, not trained to withstand interrogation or torture. This shouldn't be that hard. (And Len, he's seen a glimpse of his state of mind that he let slip, and his hostage already halfway to being broken anyway.)

"Upset that your boss kicked you out?"

That gets his attention. His gaze is sharp, bright with something not quite fury, but it's a close thing. Len knows there must have been some sort of relationship between the two, all the indicators had been there when he researched Rathaway, but whether it was a mentor-protégé type thing or something more... personal, he can't be sure. Not yet. "I lost my job; of course I'm not happy."

"But that's not it, is it? You don't care about the job, you care that he abandoned you." Len stands, walks around the chair he's tied to slowly as he speaks. It's a method that has proven useful in the past.

"It doesn't matter."

He was on the right track, then. "You trusted him, and you did _everything_ he asked you to-"

"Stop."

"-and he drops you like you never even mattered-"

"No, that's not-"

"-just like your parents did."

_He can see the flinch even from behind the man. "Please."_

"It really makes you wonder how important you actually were to him, doesn't it? Why not just turn on him? He doesn't deserve your loyalty, you've got to be angry at him for what he did to you."

"I- no-"

"This doesn't have to end badly for anyone but him."

He's come full circle now. Rathaway is hyperventilating, and... that's not the reaction he was hoping for, despite being a possibility, because he doesn't need him passing out or going into a panic attack. That would be counterproductive. He wants anger, the need for revenge. Maybe it's too soon after the break for him to feel that, maybe he's still trying to piece himself back together and has no room for fury, not yet. It would've been ideal to wait longer before having kidnapped him for this very reason, but Len hadn't had the time for that... (He can't help but wonder what, exactly, Wells did to him. It must have been a truly terrible end between them.)

He is reminded again why he doesn't do this sort of thing.

"Just tell me what I want to know and you can go." His voice isn't quite gentle, but it's softer, and he sits back down. Har- Rathaway is still a little panicked, but that spark returns, and his reply is biting.

"No, then you're going to kill me. Let's not insult my intelligence. The Particle Accelerator is fatally flawed and I will not have anything else to do with it, much less tell you about it so you can make another." 

That he didn't know. "It's flawed?"

He's glaring at Len, now. "There's a good chance that it will explode once it's turned on."

"And why didn't anyone fix this?"

"I _tried,_ and I got fired for it, as you well know."

"You're saying he wants this thing to go off?"

 _"Yes."_ He says. All the fight has gone out of him, and suddenly he looks exhausted, the bone-deep weariness of someone who just doesn't care anymore. There's hints of guilt in his expression, even though it's clearly not his fault this is happening, that he tried to stop it.

He's stood again without meaning to. That's not okay. This thing is supposed to be good, and Harrison Wells is supposed to be a decent person. And now he's trying to commit mass murder? Even going so far as to fire his favourite to prevent it from being stopped? What kind of bullshit is this? This is the sort of thing you expect from terrorists. But, wait- "Why haven't you done anything? Gone to the news?" Before Len knows it he's standing over him.

"He said he would destroy my life if I did." He says, so quiet Len barely hears it.

 

He doesn't know at what point he decided that he was going to entirely change his plans, but what matters is that he did. He didn't know how yet, but... Len was going to stop the Particle Accelerator.

 

And to do that, he was going to need Hartley Rathaway's help.

"Do you want to stop it?"

"I- what?" He sounds hopelessly lost.

"Help me stop it from ever being turned on." Len knows getting him to do it is a long shot, after what's transpired here, but maybe...

"I _can't_ , I told you. He'll-"

"Wells won't ever know you were involved."

Rathaway looks up at him, and his eyes are glistening, but his voice is hard. "You can't promise that."

"I can."

"Why? Why in the world would you even care about any of this? Ten minutes ago you were interrogating me." As if to emphasize this, he tugs on his still restrained wrists. "What do you want? I can't pay you."

Len contemplates his reply for a moment. "Maybe I felt like doing a good deed."

The look Len gets in return can only be described as _I highly doubt that._

"Are you going to help me stop this bastard or not, Rathaway?"

"Don't call me that." He snaps. "Do I even have a choice?"

"Yes. I'm not going to hurt you either way, I just thought now that you have the opportunity..."

 

"...Fine."

***

He did release him from the chair, of course, but not from the safehouse. If he did, he'd lose him, and with the near date of the Particle Accelerator's reveal, he needed the inside information to stop it, no time to hunt down escapees. He was hardly going to keep Hartley tied up the whole time, since he'd- unhappily- agreed, but he was likely to decide it wasn't worth the trouble and never come back.

Lisa had immediately taken a liking to the kid. This seemed to unnerve him, not that Len could blame him, his sister wasn't great at being friendly (like a normal person, anyway.) Still, he ended up lingering around her, and Len figured it was that she seemed the best of three unpleasant options. Not that she wasn't dangerous, because damn was she, but Mick was physically intimidating and had done nothing to change the scientist's views of him, and Len, well...

The next week was spent planning. Hartley provided the best ways to get in and to the Accelerator, how to turn it off, other useful info, and otherwise avoided them all as much as he could, especially after the one time his bitter, angry, self-preservation-lacking side reared its head and he got into a fight with Mick. Nearly getting set on fire seemed to knock some sense into his head, and he was quiet and cooperative for the few remaining days.

Lisa was upset that she didn't get to go on the job. _'You're being an overprotective jerk, Lenny!'_ He told her they couldn't all go, and someone had to make sure Hartley didn't get into trouble here, so she was the best candidate. She'd relented, still not pleased, and clearly wondering why they couldn't just let him go now that he'd helped. But Len hoped that maybe after all was said and done he could drag Hartley Rathaway into being more than a one-time partner...

Despite careful plans and every insight they could need, little seconds slipped here and there, pieces of time they needed for the plan to work, because he hadn't had time to actually look around S.T.A.R prior to this night, really get a feel for the place. He was aware of the problem, but they were in too deep now to stop, and there was only one chance at this- if things got thrown off, so be it, as long as the end goal somehow got reached. 

But those seconds counted far more than he thought they would. By the time they'd gotten into the room, to the final phase of the plan, it was too late. Being so near the center of it, they got little warning as it exploded, knocking both he and Mick to the ground and into darkness.

 

Across town, Lisa Snart's eyes flickered golden, going unnoticed as she tried to coax a screaming Hartley out of the shards of glass from the broken window, knowing no other way to help him.

 

Ice spread across the floor in a slow crawl, only to melt instantly a few feet away. The only person to witness this amid the panicked people running from the building was the man known as Harrison Wells.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been thinking about this one for months, and I finally had the time to write it. And for once I'm reasonably happy with how it came out.
> 
> On a random note, this is probably the shortest title any of my fics have ever had. 
> 
> Visit me at http://cliches-and-coffee.tumblr.com/


End file.
